


Romantic Atrocities

by beambayonet



Category: Original Work
Genre: 1990s, Based on Devilman, Getting Together, M/M, Road Trips, Substance Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 13:32:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19442461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beambayonet/pseuds/beambayonet
Summary: It is 1997, and two Missouri boys are going on a road trip.CW Suicide Attempt





	Romantic Atrocities

**Author's Note:**

> A story to go with a series of songs. [Listen here](kamclaudel.bandcamp.com).

****

**May, 1997**

  
  
It's hot out.  
  
It's not sweltering, but it's hot. In Roy Angelo's dad's 78 Pontiac Firebird, with the top down, it doesn't feel like it - pushing 85 on i-70 nearing St. Louis. And up ahead, grimly, it looks like it's going to rain.  
  
You have some options.  
  
You could grumble about how, yet again, your best friend Roy is taking you over state lines - this time at least 2 hours longer than the last, you posit, though the car doesn't have a clock, and your watch is a tick slower than it should be. And you could bitch and moan about how he always gets these ideas - fleeting, but convinced and potent - about places to go and things to do. About the world outside of KC. About anything.  
  
Or you could point out that it looks like it's gonna rain.  
  
You choose the easier path - you tell him,  
  
"We should put the top down soon."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I SAID," you repeat through the rushing winds, "WE SHOULD PUT THE TOP DOWN."  
  
"It's fiiiine," he drawls, though you barely hear it. "Rain won't get us. We're going too fast."  
  
As you slow down some 20 minutes past nearing the city, the downpour hits.

* * *

  
  
[Morning Star](https://kamclaudel.bandcamp.com/track/morning-star-2)

  
Roy's outside the quikstop  
Asks a stranger to buy him a mad dog  
You're in the firebird waiting  
You dont see this happening  
  
On a day like this you dont have to  
Be here in the mountains mist  
Think back to home, back to gladstone  
Football in oak grove park  
  
Telling Roy mindless things  
Waiting for company  
Mickey would come, right  
And so would the others  
Hitching rides from eachother  
  
And he's the star of the show  
The famous QB from missouri  
He says that it's you but you know that aint true  
Wish you'd seen it then.  
  
The one time, was snowing  
Layered up to 11  
Met up at the park, roy's chuffin a dart  
waitin for the crew  
  
Hour out in the cold you'd chatted  
Then wrestled, and then  
He flashes a grin and you raise him a smile  
And u spoke a growl  
  
Thinkin that was when  
you fell in the gravity well  
Couldnt escape, didnt want to  
Started to burn in the atmosphere  
with nothin to shield you and youre still here  
  
And hes the heart of the team  
The famous Roy Angelo, from the MO  
He says that its you but you know that aint true  
Now you see it clear  
  
Back to the car  
Mad dog in hand and his registered grin  
You start up the 'bird and you dont say a word  
And youre smiling

* * *

  
  
**Morning Star 2**

  
  
And at the Quik Stop, Roy strikes gold - after check-out he hands a stranger a fiver, the stranger goes in, comes out with a slim jim and a bottle of MD 2020 Red flavour. The cashier pretends not to notice the hand-off.  
  
Roy leans on the 78 and strikes up a dart, cool-like. He's done this before. You ask,  
  
"D'you get me a drink?"  
  
He says yeah, he did, and he hands you a peach Snapple - looking bright and confident in his faded denim jacket.

* * *

  
  
[Makeout Ridge](https://kamclaudel.bandcamp.com/track/makeout-ridge-2)

  
We're at the parking lot of denny's  
off i-64, in the mountains  
I think it's west virginia  
Roy thinks deep kentucky  
  
It's the late night menu hour  
No clock in the firebird  
I made that guess based  
on all the songs we've heard  
  
And in a rush of something  
I dont want to word tonight  
I take his oldest offer and  
We get too high to drive  
  
And we don't go inside  
  
Most an angel ever  
we reek of grass, need a shower  
Tried to lay his head down on me  
But the glovebox won't allow it  
  
Spoke a word I didnt hear  
Knew through fog and tension  
a thing we knew of long ago  
And never thought to mention  
  
I think its how this happens  
Cant know til you do  
Eggs for dinner’s seeming rad  
But mostly just with you  
  
Does that sound cool to you?

* * *

  
  
**When you kissed me**

  
  
When you kissed me, we had just eaten dinner - grand slams each at Denny's, too fucked to get back on the road. Dizzy with feeling. We were in the car, and it was dark.  
  
We were greasy and smelly, we reeked of reefer and pancakes. Two idiot boys in my dad's 78 Pontiac, quiet as mice, grasping for your hand in the limited moonlight.  
  
I wanted to tell you something. I couldn't get it out right.  
  
Sorry, Allen. And,  
  
Thanks.

* * *

  
  
**Is It Because I'm 20, Not 21?**

  
  
We don't talk about it.  
  
I mean, how could we? I have a lot of words, y'know, some better than others, for how you looked in the moonlight, barely visible but I know your face in the daytime enough to call it handsome. Other words, uncomfortable and at the tip of my tongue. For how I think about you, like a brother, like something stronger, something else.  
  
But there's things I don't have words for.  
  
How am I supposed to describe it? Am I even supposed to describe it? I was elated then, now terrified, now aiming to get royally wasted on gas station wine while you sleep on the other side of the bed.  
  
It's cool, though, Allen. I think we can get away with silence for a bit longer.  
  
I think this, and then you stir in your sleep, and my heart stops.

* * *

  
  
**Wake Up, You're Sleeping Through Heaven!**

  
  
You are Allen Fletcher, and you're 19. You are now more than a day's drive out from Kansas City with your best friend, Roy Angelo, and you just checked out of a West Virginia hotel off of I-64. You're driving.  
  
Now approaching the Virginia border, or so the map suggested when Roy last checked, the mountains have been giving way to more mountains. You're keeping track of exits as you go. The smell of drying rainfall is hot in your nose.  
  
There's a real gorgeous view up ahead, and getting prettier by the mile marker. Clouds paving way for early morning sunbeams. Ghost-adjacent mist along the freeway. A rainbow? You squint in the distance, over the mountains. Not just one - two, barely visible, but definitely two.  
  
You don't want to be alone for this.  
  
You half-mumble,  
  
"Roy,"  
  
to no response.  
  
And again, with force, "Roy!"  
  
He jolts awake, comically pushing the map off his face, glasses askew.  
  
"Wha.. What's up," he states.  
  
"Take a gander up ahead, man."  
  
You glance at him, feel warmth in your chest, and fix your eyes back on the road. "Fuckin' gorgeous, right?"  
  
He looks, and he laughs tiredly, eyes soften as he smiles, and he says,  
  
"Yeah.. Fuckin' gorgeous."

* * *

  
  
**Virginia Cometh**

  
  
Something's off about Roy.  
  
You've seen it from him before - in high school, wherein something shifts in him, and rages, breaks knucks, gibbers, and he goes from 9v battery to mains in less than a day. You don't know how to describe it. You don't want to describe it, for fear that putting it to name makes it more real. You hope you'll be home when he crashes.  
  
"So do you ever think about the connection between coastal proximity and lifespan? Quality of life?"  
  
"Uh, no man, I haven't," you offer as you pull up to the gas station. It is all you can offer.  
  
"Well, you see, I read this thing," he starts, and you know from experience to start tuning out.  
  
He stops, after a minute at least, and makes to leave, says he's grabbing drinks from inside. You should have been the one to do it, because he's not making sense when he talks about most things (and he is talking a lot), but he's paying.  
  
And now, you're pumping gas. The radio is on the oldies station.  
  
When Jimmy Ruffin sings - you punch the wall of the pump and shut it off.

* * *

  
  
[Wild Irish Bros](https://kamclaudel.bandcamp.com/track/wild-irish-bros-2)

  
  
I'm a fan of the way you move  
or whatever dumb phrase I tend to use  
I wanna make you swoon  
Am i beautiful to you?  
  
Youre driving like a demon on wheels  
You told me not to speed, and yet  
We're going 90 on i-64  
Are you angry? it feels like you are  
  
Out sipping on gas station wine  
I'm seeing double, I see u less  
Al have I said, youre my reason to live?  
...man, you must be pissed.  
  
But you turned, and I saw you  
Allen, I said, youre gorgeous  
With a glare that says you rather I don't  
Do what I do to cope  
  
Caught me as I cough it out  
Uncool and nothing like I dreamt  
I spill my guts in dad's '78

* * *

  
  
**What's Wrong With Me? Oh, You Know, The Usual**

  
  
At the gas station convenience store, I'm lightning.  
  
Thinking too fast to speak. Must be smart as a whip, and I can't believe I ever for a moment doubted this journey. This trip that's gonna change my life, the coast that's gonna change my life, that when we get there, it's gonna change Allen's life, and it's gonna change dad's life probably too.  
  
Spying the cooler, I grab drinks and head to the counter.  
  
And I'm thinking to myself, man, I'm on the cusp of something great, can't even begin to describe how it'll be, and when I get there the whole world will know and feel it, I feel it starting even now - in the 5 long line. I can't help but brim with giddy anticipation and almost overflow.  
  
Something's coming, and it's gonna be big.  
  
"Will that be all, sir?"

And as I'm rung up for my 2 waters and a peach Snapple and a bag of beef jerky, grinning like an idiot, I finally start to feel the weight of it, and I'm horrified.

* * *

  
[Fugue State Aphasia](https://kamclaudel.bandcamp.com/track/fugue-state-aphasia-2)  
  
Its daybreak then its afternoon  
and you're staring at the ceiling  
of a motel 6 before Richmond  
  
The radio says "stand by me"  
You turn your head aside  
to take Roy's softest face in  
  
Yeah he's sleeping, seems alright,  
things just haven't been great  
you hope he'll wake up better  
  
But you know him.  
  
There's a game Roy used to play,  
you remember how he'd do it  
when you were younger kids  
  
He'd mispronounce a word again  
again until you'd flip  
a game he always wins  
  
God, you hope he sleeps ok,  
takes all the guts you have  
to keep wishing to those ends  
  
His eyes flutter open,  
wish he'd slept another hour  
  
Breakfast isn't normal,  
he's on edge and he fidgets,  
he's rambling again  
  
You're out the door at half past 4,  
pay the late check out fee  
and you thank them  
  
As youre walking to the car  
he says MAN I CANT DO THIS  
then leaves his bags with you  
  
Walks out to the road, and shouts  
"God's not gonna stop me!"  
  
And when it comes,

* * *

  
  
**We Don't Talk About It**

  
  
After you've: caught your breath, guided me back to the parking lot, sat me in the car, started and then finished crying,  
  
We talk about it.  
  
It's awkward. You don't know what to say. I'm barely present, so it doesn't matter too much, but it's bothering you. You continue to be nothing but supportive.  
  
"I think we should go home," you say, in stops and pauses and starts. And, y'know, my gut instinct is to harden towards you when you say it. Dude, fuck that. We came all this way.  
  
I try to express as much, but nothing comes out. Which is to say, I agreed.  
  
You're reaching to pat my shoulder, I guessed, but instead I feel myself pulled to a full embrace, overcoming the center glovebox.  
  
We hold tight, and we don't let go until some part of you bumps the horn.

* * *

  
  
**Roy and Allen**

  
  
You're driving back West.  
  
It's been 2 or 4 hours - there's no clock on the dashboard, so you can't be sure - and it's been mostly silent. Not uncomfortable, but a little somber for sure. Every now and then you or Roy will come up with some funny anecdote or thing to pass the time.  
  
"You remember when Mickey asked me out to prom?" you offered at some point.  
  
Roy barked a laugh. "God, yeah - and didn't you take, like, Shelley or something?"  
  
"Dude I shit you not I don't remember if it was Shelley or - god, what was her name."  
  
And Roy says, and laughs, "This was two years ago Al, how could you forget?"  
  
"Oh! Oh oh oh. It was Cathy-Ann. I took Cathy." You breathe out a huff. "Christ, what would they say now?"  
  
And silence again.  
  
It's welcome, but somber. When it's time to switch seats, you're rather hesitant - something Roy has probably picked up on.  
  
"Hey, Allen?"

* * *

  
[Allen](https://kamclaudel.bandcamp.com/track/allen-2)  
  
  
Allen  
Getting soft on you while  
Traveling  
I dont expect an ounce of  
Kindness in return  
That smile you’ve got has long been earned  
  
O Allen  
  
Fletcher  
That’s what they call you in the  
Bleachers  
The kids in track would love to  
Tear your heart in half  
They’d do it just for laughs,  
  
O Allen  
  
I’ve been  
  
Dying's maybe, not the phrase  
I’d be too keen to use today  
But born perhaps, a reason, maybe you  
Melodrama words I guess  
You know I don’t speak the best  
But you've picked up on all the context clues  
  
Allen  
Wish you wouldn’t see  
How I have been  
For once to say that I am  
Glad you’re by my side  
Despite the rising tide  
  
O Allen  
  
Devil  
It’s what I’d call myself  
But, You won’t  
Like maybe I am  
Worth a half of what you gave  
Running and afraid  
  
O Devil

* * *

  
  
**The Smokehouse on 9th**

  
  
"Hey man, you hungry?"  
  
You look up from studying the map, and to Roy, whose eyes are loosely on the road, loosely on you. It's probably 10 miles out to St. Louis, and then a further 4 odd hours to home. He's got a light smile on, like he knows something you don't. You bite.  
  
"Yeah, why? You know a place?"  
  
"There's this barbeque joint my dad used to take us to, in St. Lou," he says. "Keep your eyes on the map, lemme see if we can find it."  
  
9 minutes later, you exit, and after a few mysterious turns and wide-firebird parking mishaps, you and Roy walk to The Smokehouse on 9th.  
  
You get the brisket sando, side mac. Roy, whose stature and appetite was always smaller, guns for the exact same thing.  
  
A couple minutes after you've sat n started, Roy, mouth covered in barbeque sauce in only the most charming manner, says:  
  
"Dad and I used to come here on Fridays for dinner. Back when he gave a shit, I mean."  
  
"It's fucking good," you manage through a mouthful of sando.  
  
"Yeah bro, it's rad. Same as ever."  
  
A few minutes pass, and then, you notice something.  
  
"Roy?" you start.  
  
"Mm."  
  
In his blonde mullet, on the side, you see a small streak of sauce. How did it even get there?  
  
"Hold still," you say, and you wet a napkin then reach across the table to wipe it off.  
  
"Dude, what are you-"  
  
"Easy, man, lemme get this."  
  
"Alright, alright," he concedes. You wipe it off.  
  
"Need like eight showers when we get back," you laugh.  
  
He laughs too.  
  
"Thanks, Al."  
  
And you're stunningly aware of a certain feeling. You could kiss him right here, in the middle of the restaurant, but you're going to hold onto that feeling instead. You're going to nurture it, and then after you leave...  
  
  
  
When you're back in the car, that's when he kisses you.

* * *

  
  
**Mad as Hell**

  
  
Your name is Allen Fletcher. You just stumbled home from a several day trip with your best friend Roy. And when you mosey inside, your dad is mad as hell.

**Author's Note:**

> Loosely based off ryokira, in the sense of the project's origins being "what if John D wrote an album about Devilman". You can buy a hand-bound paperback book of this if you want, with CD for $18. Message me or DM me on twitter, same @ .


End file.
